


The Oncoming Storm

by greygerbil



Category: The Man From U.N.C.L.E. (2015)
Genre: Broken Bones, Fever, Hiding Medical Issues, Hurt/Comfort, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-28
Updated: 2019-04-28
Packaged: 2020-02-09 06:41:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,783
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18632857
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/greygerbil/pseuds/greygerbil
Summary: Illya does not speak to his friends about his injuries as he should, but then, Illya and Napoleon have something else that is unspoken between them. When the spy team gets shut into a hut far from the closest town by a winter storm, the two find themselves facing all truths.





	The Oncoming Storm

**Author's Note:**

  * For [QixxiQ](https://archiveofourown.org/users/QixxiQ/gifts).



“Hurry, cowboy!”

Napoleon cursed under his breath as he adjusted the lock pick, trying to block out the thunder of rapidly approaching boots on the metal ground and the sound of Gaby reading her pistol next to him, holding it awkwardly around the bag full of valuable antique coins they had stolen back. He had to concentrate.

The lock sprang with a click that was barely audible through the shouting as, at the opposite end of the room, several men burst in from the hallway.

Napoleon threw the door open.

“Go,” Illya commanded, glancing briefly over his shoulder. “Get the car! They’ll get free shots at us if we all run.”

“What about…”

“Go!”

Gaby seemed to consider redoubling her protests, but Illya had already left their side and, like an angry bull but nowhere near as cuddly, charged head-first into the unlucky man who had managed to take point in their group of pursuers. For a moment, Napoleon wondered if he should stay, but there was no saying how many were waiting outside, and if push came to shove, Gaby was more likely to need help in a brawl than Illya – which was not a knock to Gaby’s skills, it was just that _anyone in the world_ was more likely to need help in a brawl than Illya.

With a twinge of guilt, Napoleon set out into the garden behind the mansion, taking the bag of coins from Gaby so she could properly handle her gun. Cold wind and icy rain tore at them as they ploughed through the flower beds full of leafless plants preparing for winter. However, no one was waiting for them out here. Apparently, whenever it was they’d triggered an alarm or been noticed – he’d have to figure that one out when he had more time to think –, it hadn’t been soon enough to mobilise every guard in the place.

They jumped over the short wrought-iron fence and Napoleon glanced back at the gate, which was secured only with a small, frail-looking padlock.

“Should we collect Illya by car?” he asked Gaby, wiping rain out of his face.

“Good idea.”

Napoleon broke the gate open with a kick and ran after her down the street to where their black car was parked at the curb. He climbed into the passenger seat while Gaby did a narrow turn, then drove through the gate, its iron doors bouncing off the bumper with a rattle. What of the plants at the edges of the narrow main walking path had survived their flight was now mowed down when Gaby drove the car over them.

Already Napoleon prepared to jump out and lend a hand to their friend when Illya stumbled through the door, dazed-looking but on his feet, still holding a piece of someone’s sleeve in his balled first. He looked about ready to pounce on the car out of sheer instinct alone when realisation crossed his face and instead, he tore the back door open and slid in.

“More are coming. I heard,” he muttered. “We need to leave.”

“Already on our way.”

While Gaby manoeuvred them out of the dead end and headed for the street, Napoleon took a look over his shoulder. Illya had a bloody nose and a split lip, and he was sitting with his weight shifted to the right.

“You okay there?”

Seeing him now, it bothered him that he hadn’t stayed to help, but letting Gaby flee alone, holding the biggest target – the coins – , would have been too great a risk, too.

“Of course,” he said impatiently. “Do you still have the coins?”

“Don’t worry, they train us right here in the West.”

A shot was fired. Napoleon heard it ping against the metal back of the car. Next to him, Gaby hammered her heel down on the gas pedal.

“Might be time to duck your heads, my friends,” Napoleon said, taking his own advice as the figures who were rapidly receding in the rear view mirror kept pelting their car with shots.

The men did not, in fact, manage to crack a window, with the wind and rain probably not helping their aim. However, when Gaby finally slid out onto the street, Napoleon heard metal dragging against the ground as the car veered slightly left. They must have hit a back tyre.

“We’ll drive the car as far as it takes us,” Gaby suggested, tapping her forefinger against the steering wheel. “It’ll be faster still, and I don’t look forward to walking in this weather.”

“Peril may have to hold us down like an anchor to keep us being blow away in this wind,” Napoleon agreed, looking over his shoulder again for a reaction from Illya. However, Illya was just staring out of the window with a strained look on his face.

-

They shook their pursuers, but their car broke down just outside of Alençon, and they walked in single file down the side of the road, along a narrow muddy track between the pothole-filled tarmac and a shorn wheat field. Their contact was waiting at the appointed place in a bar, looking with some surprise at them, wet and dirt-stained like pigs come fresh from rolling in puddles as they were. The young man had probably expected a somewhat more glamorous entrance from U.N.C.L.E.’s international top-spy team.

But hell, they’d gotten the job done, hadn’t they? And while Napoleon preferred to look good doing it, that was still the most important part.

“At least if we were followed, they won’t get the coins now,” Illya said, leaning against the thick wooden beam of the bar’s doorway as they watched the man climb into a small red car with their booty.

“Just our heads,” Gaby answered, pocketing the train tickets and keys to their next safehouse the informant had given them. “That’s very soothing.”

“You two are such pessimists,” Napoleon answered. “We’ll be out of here in an hour if we go by train. The powers that be want us in Beauvais as fast possible, anyway. Of course, maybe we should stop there and take some time to assess the damages,” he added, glancing at Illya.

Predictably, his comrade shook his head.

“A bloody nose is no reason to tarry,” he said, in a lecturer’s voice. “There will be enough time to sit around on the train.”

“Hopefully, there’ll be some room to changes clothes there, too,” Gaby said, shaking out her damp sleeves.

-

Of course they found themselves crammed into a train full of early morning commuters into Rouen, with no seat and certainly nowhere to change. There was a spot where the engine warmed the wall, at least, big enough for Illya alone or Gaby and Napoleon squeezed tightly together, and Illya decided for them that he would rather stand crowded against the window, staring out at the grey sky. He looked good with his wet clothes plastered to his broad chest and thick thighs, but Napoleon didn’t think it could be too comfortable.

Their next assignment had them placed up in nowhereland in the vicinity of Beauvais in a hide-out close to the villa of a wealthy, treacherous, and very careful tycoon up in the countryside, so they could stake out the place before attempting to take him in for the numerous crimes he had committed. After buying food from a small shop in the pale light of morning, they stuffed their supplies into the back of a car waiting for them at the train station courtesy of their employer and made their way down a road that grew less and less cared for with each mile, until all that was left was a path of mostly barren earth. Snow was coming down now, first in small flakes, then thick like a curtain. Gaby leaned forward in her seat, muttering in German under her breath, as she pulled the car slowly up the shallow hillside.

“We might get a look or two at our target if we fight through the snow, but I doubt we’re going to make it back into town anytime soon,” Napoleon noted, when they had finally arrived at a hut that, subtracting its snowy white mantle in his mind, could well be the place the place the informant had described to them.

“We have enough food. We don’t need to go back to Beauvais,” Illya decided, clambering out of the back of the car and letting his gaze wander over the woods that reached almost up to the small house. “If we run out, we hunt.”

Napoleon could not quite contain his grin at the thought of Illya stalking a deer through the forest, possibly to wring its neck with his bare hands.

“Right, why not? I’d like to see you wrestling a pack of wolves.”

“Wolves don’t taste good. The meat is too tough.”

With those words, Illya pushed off the car and marched past them towards the hut, with their bags of groceries in hand. Napoleon shot a glance at Gaby and saw that she, too, seemed to be weighing the odds of Illya having eaten wolf meat before. He somehow only arrived at a fifty per cent chance that it was a joke.

The house was barely less freezing than the outside, but without the sting of wind and snow in his face, the temperature was much easier to bear. Napoleon knelt by the fireplace, finding the metal box next to it thankfully full of chopped wood, and took a match out of his pocket to light a fire, sighing as the sudden warmth of flames springing up on dry kindling washed over him. As he looked up, he saw Illya standing by his side.

“You must be frozen solid by this point.”

Illya hadn’t even had the small comfort of the engine heat on the train, and that had been little enough.

“I’m used to winters Moscow,” Illya answered haughtily. “This is nothing.”

“Alright, I understand. You’re built all of ice, Peril.”

Napoleon took the chance to haul himself up to his feet again and pat the bulging muscle under Illya’s damp shirt, allowing his hand to linger just a little too long on his arm. Since it seemed to be Illya’s mission in life to have a complaint about everything he did or said, it was always interesting to him that he had never yet griped about these touches. Even now, he just held Napoleon’s gaze. It would have been a better moment without the bruises that were blooming all across his nose and cheek.

“You really took a beating back there. Are you sure you don’t want to rest up?”

“It’d be better to change clothes and see the target’s house before we do anything else,” Illya said. “We shouldn’t waste time.”

One thing was for certain: if more KGB agents were like Illya, the U.S. might have already had to admit defeat. He didn’t seem to know when to stop or how and Napoleon was not his father, so he couldn’t exactly tell him no, even if his instincts whispered that this wasn’t wise.

-

Bundled in clothes that rapidly grew as clammy as the ones they’d left behind, they took a forage out into the snow to get an impression of the layout of the mansion from up on a wooded hilltop. It was a giant building with left and right wings, like an old French palace, and a garden between them. The fence here was high and topped with spikes. They wouldn’t be driving any cars into that place, even without the storm.

It grew dark when they trudged back and though it was barely five in the afternoon, they fell into their beds as soon as they had returned, as none of them had slept in over thirty hours. Napoleon was out so fast he could not even appreciate the fact that he got to share a room with Illya this time, as they had of course left the room for one – which seemed to be built for a child, judging by the books on the shelves – to the lady; they had taken the parent’s bedroom, which was chastely (and to Napoleon’s great disappointment) outfitted with two single beds grouped around a nightstand.

He woke to a watery sun shining in a washed-out blue sky the next morning. Illya’s bed was already deserted, but as he made his way downstairs after taking the hottest shower the old boiler could muster, he heard him coughing from where he sat on the sofa in a thick black sweater.

“Good morning,” Napoleon said brightly.

“Morning,” Illya answered, voice like two stones rubbing together.

“Was the French winter too much for our Soviet visitor after all?”

Illya looked up. His face was pink and his eyes glassy and unfocused, even as he scowled at Napoleon.

“It’s just a cold,” he muttered.

“I’d offer you tea, but I don’t know where it is,” Napoleon noted as he strolled into the kitchen. “Didn’t we bring some?”

“Gaby did, yes.”

Glancing over his shoulder, Napoleon saw Illya haul himself off the sofa. He expected him to join him in the search, but instead, he stood still for a moment and then simply went down to one knee. The levity fled from Napoleon’s mood in an instance as he dropped the grocery bag he’d been holding and walked back.

“Peril?”

He leaned down by his side, but Illya swatted at his outstretched hand.

“It’s fine,” he ground out. “I’m fine.”

“Obviously,” Napoleon muttered, taking hold of his shoulder to pull him up. The hiss of pain Illya released made him let go again very quickly.

“I can do this myself,” Illya said, grabbing on to the sofa and dragging himself back up. “I can…”

Once more, he collapsed, this time at least onto the sofa. There was genuine fear written across his face now, of an animal, furious and unreasonable kind.

“Illya, don’t worry, you’ll be alright-”

“We’re on a mission. I can’t get sick now!”

Napoleon wondered whether he was afraid of them, or whether it was a fear of failure dug much deeper, but decided it had to be the latter. They had grown too close now that Illya would still expect a knife in his back.

“Look, it’s just Gaby and me in this house and we haven’t even started going in on our target yet. What do you think will happen?” Napoleon asked, sitting by his side.

“It will be delayed. It’s my fault-”

“Well, it happens. We’re not automatons.”

Illya looked at him with doubt, but was distracted by a cough that made him wince in pain, one hand reaching for his chest, though not touching it.

He’d gone from good enough to pretend to be fine to unable to stand in under a night. Napoleon figured he might have been nursing a bug for a bit, hiding it from them because of pride or duty, but perhaps something else was occupying his body that was drawing strength away.

“Did you get hurt in that fight yesterday?” he asked, glancing at his chest.

“Not badly.”

That was a yes.

“Just let me take a look. I promise not to touch… unless you want me to.”

It was still fun to make this bear of a man look flustered, the rare times he managed, but this time Napoleon was joking to hide the way his stomach flipped in concern. After a moment’s hesitation, Illya finally drew up his sweater.

The flesh across the left side of his ribcage was covered in purple and blue bruises, broad and wide enough that Napoleon could have placed both hands on him and still not fully covered them. The sight alone made him draw in air through his teeth.

“That should be three or four broken ribs, I’m guessing.”

“Nothing that can be done about that,” Illya said curtly.

“Except you also have a bad cold or influenza, and coughing and broken ribs are a great combination for pneumonia.”

“So the cowboy is a doctor now?” Illya asked testily.

“No, but I was in a war.” He well remembered the compounding illnesses spreading like wildfire among wounded soldiers in the hastily erected tent hospitals. “And I’m sure you don’t actually need me to tell you this like it’s new information. If it was anyone but yourself, you’d think they’d be stupid not to be resting.”

His voice had grown a bit sterner than he’d planned, but perhaps that was needed to get Illya’s attention instead of trying to provoke him into a quip as usual. It was currently dawning on Napoleon that this could actually become a serious problem, especially considering they were stuck for the time being.

Illya stared at Napoleon with defiance in his eyes and Napoleon held his gaze. He didn’t know how long they sat there until Illya finally broke and looked away, but it couldn’t have been less than a minute.

“I’ll be upstairs.”

When Napoleon offered him his arm to pull himself up on, Illya took it, still without looking him in the face. It was a good thing that Illya still managed to carry some of his own weight, otherwise Napoleon doubted he would ever have gotten him up that staircase.

“We won’t get a doctor here in this storm,” he said, as he deposited Illya on his bed. “You should have said something while we were still in range of civilisation.”

“I didn’t think it would be so bad,” Illya admitted through gritted teeth. “I don’t get sick.”

There was still that hint of fear in his voice. Napoleon doubted he was worried what would happen to him because of his illness; if he’d had to bet, he’d have wagered Illya just didn’t deal well with being weak and in need of help.

“Just take it easy for now,” he said, softening his voice.

Illya scowled at him.

“I don’t need your pity, cowboy.”

“Well, too bad, you look pretty pathetic right now. So if you want to fix that, I suggest lying down.”

This shut Illya up. He did as he was told, which was good, but Napoleon couldn’t help but feel guilt well up, anyway. It was fun to push into Illya when he gave back as good as he got, but right now it felt more like he was using the fact that Illya was used to being strong-armed and treated harshly even by the people on his side against him. Much as he was loyal to the KGB, there had been some anecdotes Napoleon had heard that had made him wonder about Illya’s position there. He was clearly as much agent as he was a weapon, and those in power seemed to figure it was best to keep him on a short, tight leash lest his family’s volatile history continued in him.

Napoleon closed the door behind himself. As he went downstairs, he found Gaby in the kitchen.

“Where are you two?”

“Our Soviet friend thought the flu and broken ribs were a good combination to walk around on, so he’s back in bed,” Napoleon said, digging through their bags for the tea.

“What? Why didn’t he say anything?”

“Don’t ask me.”

Gaby glanced out of the window into the snow. Napoleon guessed she probably had the same thought as him about the proximity of the closest hospital or doctor.

“I say we’ll continue observing our businessman friend while we wait for Illya to at least get over the worst of it. We would have been stuck here staking the place out for a few days, anyway.” He finally found the bag of rose hip tea that Gaby had grabbed on their brief stop in town. “Would you sacrifice this for our incapacitated friend?”

“Of course,” she said. “He must be bad off to willingly stay in bed, though.”

Napoleon gave a vague nod, neither wanting to lie nor make her worry as much as he did. It wasn’t like either of them could do anything about it right now.

“Old Monsieur Gaspard has been holed up in his fortress of a mansion for years now. It won’t matter much to wait another week,” Gaby murmured.

“It’ll be like a vacation,” Napoleon answered, with a bright smile. “You can finish that book you’ve been carrying around since London.”

Gaby deigned to smile at him despite the fact that Napoleon felt his usual bravado may have been somewhat lacking. He busied himself with a tea kettle, frowning at his own lack of calm. Flirting with Illya had at first been just another provocation and, when he found he was not rebuffed as bluntly as he’d figured he would be, an intriguing game he liked to play. It seemed that hiding crouched behind his own words had been a little more feeling than he’d wanted to admit – story of his life, really. But all that aside, he had already been forced to acknowledge some time ago that Illya and Gaby were the closest thing to friends a man like him was likely to have. He did not plan on losing Illya here.

When the tea was ready, he brought a mug of it upstairs, knocking briefly at the door before entering. Illya lifted his head from the pillow.

“I just told Gaby it’s better if you two do not come in here,” he muttered. “You could get sick, too.”

“I have a pretty good immune system,” Napoleon said with a shrug and placed the tea on the quaint little lace doily covering the nightstand. “This is the best we have for medicine right now.”

“You didn’t need to do that.”

“I’m just nice that way,” Napoleon said and grinned.

Illya rolled his eyes, pushing himself up on his arm to take a sip of the hot liquid.

“You have to reach out to U.N.C.L.E. as soon as the storm clears up and tell them that you may need back-up,” Illya murmured.

“We’re going to reach out to a doctor first, Peril.”

Illya frowned.

“I will not have you two hurt because I made a bad call,” he said.

“We’ll be fine.”

“But-”

“But you need to stop speaking because you sound a few words away from losing your voice.”

Illya grunted in response, placing the mug down to sink back against the pillow. He looked miserable and guilty. Before Napoleon’s brain could catch up with his desire to make Illya feel better, he found he had stretched out his hand to brush some damp hair from his forehead. He froze for a moment, expecting Illya to slap his hand away, but he didn’t, and so he put the strands aside carefully and then pressed his palm against his skin.

“You’re hotter than the tea kettle. I’ll find a towel and some cold water.” 

Illya nodded his head against Napoleon’s hand.

This was a much better way to get him to quiet down than snapping at him, Napoleon considered, carrying a garish red plastic bowl with some small hand towels out of the bathroom. After drenching one and wringing it out, leaving the bowl to crowd the tea on the doily, he draped the towel over Illya’s forehead.

“I’ll check on you later.”

“Alright.”

Illya turned to look at the ceiling, brow drawn in thought.

-

When Gaby and him had returned from a forage to their target’s house in late noon and worked their way out of several layers of snow-stiff clothes, Napoleon’s first stop was the upstairs bedroom. It was dark in there now and he didn’t touch the light switch, since he didn’t want to wake Illya. However, he turned as Napoleon stepped up to the nightstand to take the empty tea mug.

“What about our target?”

“Sitting nice and still. And how is the fever doing?” he asked, reaching out again, glad for the excuse as much as he cared to know an honest answer. Illya’s forehead was still much too hot. When Napoleon wanted to pull back, however, he found Illya’s hand wrap tight as a vice around his wrist.

“The water you brought is warm now. Your hand is cold,” Illya murmured.

Napoleon had to laugh.

“That makes sense,” he allowed, spreading his fingers out over Illya’s forehead as he sat down on the edge of the bed.

“What is this?” Illya asked, after a long moment. “We keep doing these things.”

“I don’t know, you tell me.”

It was not the slickest answer Napoleon had ever come up with. You did dance around it with men, of course. Wouldn’t want to make yourself a target by being too obvious about your proclivities, although he had a feeling that even were he less certain that Illya wanted him in some way, Illya would not go tell on Napoleon to their superiors. Still, what Napoleon wanted – it was more than he usually asked for. You could convince a lot of people to give up a night to you, eventually, but their heart was a pretty different matter.

“More,” Illya said after a moment. “More than just you teasing, cowboy. Because you do that to everyone.”

Napoleon felt a smile tug at the corner of his mouth even as his heart bumped against his ribcage in a little leap.

“You’re right, you are special. I wouldn’t want to lose sight of that,” he said. “I knew that from the night I first met you, when you grabbed on to a speeding car and almost didn’t lose the fight.”

Illya snorted, and coughed. Napoleon lifted his hand, now lukewarm, and leaned down, placing a chaste kiss on Illya’s dry lips.

“I told you, you’ll get sick,” Illya said, but he didn’t turn his head away.

“It will have been worth it,” Napoleon decided. “I’m getting you fresh water for the towels, now that you warmed me up.”

Illya, who was still loosely holding on to his wrist, didn’t let go until Napoleon gently wound his hand out of his grip after a few long moments. When he walked out of the room, he could feel himself grinning like an idiot. Perhaps there had been one good thing to Illya getting sick – but since he had gained from it in this way, it was now doubly his duty to make sure that poor Illya did not pay for it.

-

“Are you sure you can do this?”

“It’s a couple hour’s walk each way, but I think I can at least get some food and medicine.”

Gaby slung her scarf about her neck. Through the open door fell the bright sun of a cold but clear early winter’s day. The street was still piled high with snow, but the storm had stopped and the world laid white and peaceful.

“I can come along if you’d like,” Napoleon offered, again

“There’s nothing more dangerous than a deer or two I could run into, despite your talk of wolves,” Gaby said, raising a brow at him. “Besides, one of us should stay with Illya.”

“True, but if you’d rather relax here, I can make the trip into town.”

“I don’t mind. I don’t like being cooped up in here. Besides, Illya seems to like it when you fuss over him.”

She laughed and Napoleon joined in, briefly wondering how much she guessed about them. She was a spy, after all, and the best ones sometimes knew what the people themselves didn’t yet. But if she had found out or cared, she did not let it on, and Napoleon thanked her for that.

After he had closed the door behind her, he went into the kitchen for some more hot tea. He had never thought he would like playing nurse, but it came with enough excuses for furtive touches and private conversations between them, and knowing he helped make Illya comfortable was actually making him a little proud. Still, Napoleon hoped he wouldn’t get another chance all too soon, for he generally wanted Illya to stay in one piece.

When he went upstairs, he saw Illya sitting on the side of the bed.

“I’m going to tie you down to that mattress if you are on the way to anywhere else but the bathroom. It’s been three days, you are nowhere near out of the woods,” Napoleon warned him.

“I’d like to see you try, cowboy,” Illya answered, though he didn’t make a move to stand up.

Grinning, Napoleon placed the tea down on the doily. “Get well and I’ll show you how well I handle rope in the bedroom.”

Illya stared at him and Napoleon decided that he liked him flushing pink much better when it wasn’t from fever.


End file.
